The Boy I met in the Room of Requirement
by sakshi.chopra
Summary: After a spoiled Yule Ball, Hermione badly requires something the Room of Requirement is quite happy to supply. Meanwhile, Tom Riddle is upto his ears in illegal dark magic that unknowingly draws his soulmate to him.[Tomione]. Teenaged Tom Riddle and Hermione.
1. Chapter 1

**I am fairly new to the Harry Potter Fanfiction world. But I have been swept up in it since a couple of months now. I am working on a Dramione story (The Dragon) which has two chapter remaining till the end. However, I am intrigued with the idea of Tom Riddle and Hermione Granger and the possibilities where these two could go. There is so little interaction, indirect at best, with these to in canon and so many things they did have in common. I was intrigued enough to write something up. No time travel in this story on either end, but Tom and Hermione do meet as teens. What can I say? Hogwarts is a magical castle after all. **

**I hope you enjoy this story. It is a one-shot right now but I have a few ideas and if the readers want, I would want to write more on this. Please share your thoughts/suggestions/critique. **

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Hermione Granger sat in the corner of the staircase leading to the great hall, held her aching feet in her hands and cried. She cried and ranted and fumed. She mentally cursed her two idiot friends to the moon and back, Ron Weasley for being a right blind git and Harry Potter for not standing up to the stupid Ron Weasley when he was being a right blind git with the emotional capacity of a teaspoon.

"Alright there, Hermione?"

Padma Patil crouched in front of her, flanked by her worried looking twin Parvati. The two Indian witches had been her friends' dates. Hermione knew the two fools had spoilt Padma and Parvati's evenings too. At one point of the evening, she had caught sight of Padma dancing with Draco Malfoy of all people, raising Ron's ire a couple more notches.

_Well good for her_, Hermione seethed, _and serves Ron right!_

Outwardly though, she got her hiccups in control and answered with as much dignity as she could muster in a few seconds.

"I'll be fine Padma. Parvati. I didn't get a chance to tell you before, but you both look beautiful. Did you girls enjoy your evening?"

A look passed between the twins and they started giggling.

"Oh yes." Padma managed to say in between bouts of merry giggles.

"We did" they both answered in sync, looked at each other and laughed some more. Their easy camaraderie and little secret jokes made Hermione feel lonely. Logically she knew her melancholy was just aftereffects of a fight with her friends and because of the anticlimactic way her evening had ended. All she'd wanted for tonight was to look beautiful and feel a little special. For a precious few hours she'd felt desired from Victor Krum's attentions. But then he'd gone back with the other Durmstrang students and her Cinderella's ball had ended. Her friends turned into pumpkins she wanted to kick. Her pretty dress got all dirty and wrinkled from the way she was sitting on the dusty steps. Three hours she'd spent on taming her hair, another hour into putting on makeup and making sure her dress fit her beautifully. Those were four hours she'd never get back. She hadn't even gotten a kiss for all her efforts. Harry and Ron had made sure to pout and moan and put on a show in front of Krum, chasing away her good spirits and her star seeker.

_Bloody meddling gits!_

"Are you girls going back to the dorms?" she asked Padma. Maybe in trailing along with them, the sisters' chatter would cheer her up or at least distract her from her woes.

"No. We've been invited to the Slytherin dungeons for an after party." Padma's cheeks went red as she whispered, carefully looking around to make sure no one overheard.

"There's an after party?" Hermione exclaimed, surprised at herself that she didn't think of it before. They were wizards and witches but still teenagers. School dances, muggle or magical, would always continue on to after parties for the kids that were too cool or wired to go to bed. She'd never been cool and engaging enough for her muggle friends. Apparently, she wasn't good enough for the wizarding folks either.

Who would invite boring, studious, rule abiding Hermione Granger to have fun after hours?

Bitter anger flared up inside her, this time unfairly, at people who were going to break rules and live a little.

"You are going to a party after hours? In the Slytherin dungeons no less! What if you get caught? You could get detention or loose precious points. We work hard for those points you know." she snapped, trying but failing at hiding her displeasure and jealousy from showing on her expressive face.

Parvati stiffened and Padma straightened up from her position in front of Hermione. They took a step back from the disheveled disapproving witch, again in complete sync with each other, as if they had practiced their moves.

"Suit yourself Granger. And go back to your high tower." Shrugged Parvati, "It's not like you have anywhere else to go anyways."

Without a look back, Padma and Parvati made their way down the halls, away from the stairs and from Hermione. They didn't see the look of pure misery cross Hermione's face at their not so veiled insult. Before more students came out and noticed her miserable tear stained face, Hermione gathered herself and stood up. She dusted and straightened her dress as best as she could, picked up her shoes and turned to climb the stairs, silently on naked feet.

When the turn for the Gryffindor tower entrance came about, she didn't go that way and kept climbing the ever-shifting stairs. They moved this way and that, leading the distracted witch on their own mysterious way. Suddenly Hermione was standing in the corridor leading to the Room of Requirement. She walked three times in front of the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy, thinking about how lovely it could have been if like Padma and Parvati, she had somewhere to go too.

Somewhere, or to _someone_…

Suppressed longings of an innocent teenage heart burst forth, filling her head with things she worked hard to steer clear off. Exciting things. Like boyfriends and her newfound desire for secret kisses in darkened alcoves, for the possessive touch of someone who couldn't bear to remain far from her, for someone who held her hand under the big tables of the great hall as they had their meals. How lovely would it be for someone to lay peacefully in her lap while she read a book, sometimes silent and sometimes discussing what she was reading. How exciting would it be if she had someone to go head to head with her over all the new things she learnt every day, without them calling her a know-it-all swot or a good for nothing else bookworm.

A door appeared in the wall, the door to the room of requirement. Hermione wasn't quite sure what the room could have conjured for her. Sure, she'd wanted for somewhere to hide, lick her wounds and regroup before she had to face everyone again tomorrow. But she'd also been thinking of her other secret desires. Could the room have something to fulfill those wishes too?

She opened the door and peered inside. And gasped.

It looked as if the Hogwarts Library had moved house and decided to settle down, in its entirety, inside the room of requirement. Without Madam Pince. And anyone else for that matter. She had the Hogwarts Library all to herself.

_Oh who needed boys after all!_

Hermione stepped inside, shut the door behind her and did a little winning cheer jig she once saw on the tele. The clearing of a throat snapped her out of her impromptu performance and she looked around to find the source. A boy sat in a reading area a few feet away, in the shadows of a book shelf. A huge book sat his arms. His gaze traveled the length of her body, from the roots of her slick-eazyed hair, roaming over her fitted formal chiffon gown, to her calves exposed because she held the end of her dress in the hand that wasn't holding her shoes, down to the painted toes of her bare feet. Hermione colored and let the dress fall to her toes again.

He stood up and stepped out of the shadows. And ohh the minstrels sang in Hermione's head as light fell on his face. His classically handsome chiseled face. She noticed that he was very tall. His hair was dark and curly but neatly combed back. His school robes were black with a Slytherin crest, starkly contrasting with his pale skin. His eyes were dark too, dramatically so. Hermione Granger was pretty sure she had never seen this boy around school before. She would have remembered him. Did the room call him there somehow? If such a thing indeed happened, Hermione was in awe over how perfectly the room had understood her half baked fantasies and produced this paragon of perfection. Complete with a huge… book in his arms.

"Who are you?" she asked the boy as well as herself and the room.

"Who are you?" He questioned back, perfectly polite.

The witch took a step in his direction.

"My name is Hermione Granger. I am a student. I am sure I haven't seen you ever before. Are you a student too?"

The boy took two steps towards her.

"My name is Tom Riddle. I am the head boy of this school. I haven't seen you before either and that is very strange. Have you ingested Polyjuice by any chance? Or some other forbidden potion? And what do you think you are doing in the library, after hours, dressed like that, young lady? What's your house?"

Hermione's heart thudded in her chest. Head Boy huh? This Tom Riddle could not be the head boy. Percy Weasley was the head boy, the prat. Even though Riddle's robes said he was a Slytherin, the fantasy was getting better and better. Tall, dark and handsome, check. Studying in the library on the night of a school dance, check. A slightly older authority figure without the taboo of being a teacher? Check, check, check!

_Well then._

"I'm lost sir Mr. Head boy. Please help me." Hermione blinked her eyes innocently and pouted for good measure. She didn't have much experience with flirting and if she'd been anywhere else with anyone even close to being like this ridiculously hot guy, she'd have clammed right up. Or started spouting random facts from Hogwarts a History! Or corrected his grammar, if he made a mistake. But something about being secure in the privacy of the Room of Requirement, with the Room supplied fantasy library and fantasy head boy brought out her playful cheeky side.

Tom Riddle rolled his eyes at her theatrics.

"You are in the school library. If you think you're lost, then clearly you have no business being out here at this hour. Go back to your dorm Miss-"

"Hermione Granger."

Riddle cocked a brow. He looked really good doing that.

"Miss Hermione Granger." He intoned, "Go back to your dorm."

"That's the thing. I can't find it. I'm afraid I'll have to spend the night here." Hermione said mock seriously, shaking her head.

Tom sighed. And moved his wand in the way of casting a diagnostic on her.

"Let me guess! You are a Gryffindor, aren't you? No wonder you're lost in the library."

"That's mean!" Her pout wasn't fake this time. "I am a Gryffindor and I love the library. Getting lost in the library is actually a fantasy of mine."

"Getting lost in the…" Tom shook his head and scrunched his brows, "First of all twenty points from Gryffindor for breaking curfew and wasting my time! Secondly-"

"Twenty points?" Hermione exclaimed. Even if this was all pretend, twenty points was a lot of deduction for just being out of bed. Plus, no fantasy of Hermione's ever included losing house points. That just wasn't done. This head boy needed to be reigned in.

"Secondly," Riddle ground his teeth in annoyance, "Are you, by any chance, under the influence of an illegal potion? Or have you glamoured your looks?"

"Obviously not!" Hermione scoffed and folded her arms over her chest.

"Nothing obvious about it." Riddle shook his head, "I have never seen you before and this is my seventh year as a student. You look to be in your third or fourth year. And if you love the library so much, I would surely have seen you here before. So, I'll ask again and for the last time, have you ingested Polyjuice potion? Or have you charmed your face into this pretty mask to get away with your mounting crimes?"

"Mounting crimes?" Hermione repeated, growing more exasperated by the second, "What crimes? What are you even talking about? You're not even the real head boy. Or a real boy for that matter! You are just my fantasy that the Room made for me."

_xxxxxxx_

Riddle blinked. Words were rapidly failing him. There were so many things wrong with what the girl, Hermione Granger, had just thrown at him. He didn't know where to begin. She'd caught him at a bad time too. He had been experimenting with very complex and a possibly illegal combination of runic spells in his journal. It consisted of a dark rune for summoning the living, combined with his self created runes that approximately notated the parseltongue mate and fate sounds, all drawn with his blood in a diary that contained a piece of his soul. It was tricky work that required his complete concentration. The girl with her barmy claims and low cut ballgown and pretty heels and unconventionally beauty was ruining his concentration and needed to be scared away.

Weirdly enough with this particular witch, he didn't want to scold, insult or hex, his heretofore three favorites things to do with meddling students.

_What the bloody hell was wrong with him?_

In a pinch, Tom always went with intimidation. That worked well enough in most sticky situations.

With that in mind, Tom Riddle shut off and placed his journal which was charmed to look like a heavy tome, safely in his heavily warded bag. He walked towards the girl till he towered over her and stared at her, down his nose, satisfied that the difference in their heights helped his cause. His face was blank, his eyes intense. This particular look always left his followers quaking in their expensive dragon hide boots. Hermione Granger would soon learn her place in the grand scheme of things.

A couple seconds passed in silence. Tom decided that was enough for discomfiting her.

"Keep mouthing off Miss Granger. Make me angry, I dare you. You would rue the moment you decided to flounce into the library in that ridiculous dress and disturb my peace once I start with your punishment."

Contrary to all of the head boy's past experience, Hermione Granger didn't flinch. Her cheeks gained color though. She didn't break eye contact, instead her pupils dilated. She didn't step back. Instead, the infuriating girl leaned closer. She took a breath. The strange witch, seemingly suppressing a moan, stepped into him, closer than he was comfortable with and took a deep sniff off of his cloak lapels.

"You smell of new parchment...Mmm" she whisper-groaned.

Tom Riddle gulped and fought his instinct to step back. That would be like conceding a round and Tom wouldn't be caught dead admitting he needed distance to control what was currently happening with his young teenage body.

Not aware of his struggle, the little witch grabbed his robes in her fists and buried her nose in his chest.

"Wh…What do you think you are doing? Unhand me right this minute Miss Granger."

"But you are my fantasy. And you smell like books and picnics and home. I don't want to let you go!" came her muffled response.

Very strange was the fact that Tom Riddle _still_ _didn't_ _want_ to scoff at her forwardness and fling her hands away from his person. He had been propositioned plenty times, sometimes with, sometimes without his express consent. Women, girls and some boys threw themselves at him all the time. He had gotten used to it and usually handled it with sharp words or magic. He didn't want to hex this Hermione Granger. Even less was his desire to cut a cruel remark. In a sea of unremarkable witches and wizards, this young witch was turning out to be an astounding anomaly and an irresistible enigma.

He kept his arms and hands at his sides, but dipped his head and just as an experiment, nuzzled the top of her head. Her hair was tightly coiled in curls, kept in place with a hundred pins, magic and some kind of smelly potion. Despite the frivolity, the mop of brown curls felt soft and warm. He caught a whiff of another essence underlying the scent of the strong styling potions and the obvious flowery perfume she was wearing. Not quite believing the turn of events, his hands came up to grab her shoulders as he inhaled deeply again. He caught notes of the scent of the sea, dark chocolate and old parchment. Suddenly he wanted to fist the whole mass of her hair and just snort the essence into his lungs. It was the essence of his Amortentia. And it drove Tom crazy with need.

He cupped her face in his large hands and tilted it up. He met her glazed eyes and felt his control slip another notch. Angling her slightly, Tom touched Hermione's slightly parted lips with his own and breathed her in. His eyes closed in ecstasy. His fingers burrowed further in her hair, dislodging pins and sticking charms. He pressed his body to hers, eager to feel her against himself. He heard his own moan and distantly a thought flitted through his preoccupied head that his behavior was not appropriate for the Hogwarts Library. He promptly chased away that thought with another whiff of the lovely Eau-De-Hermione.

Propriety could go fuck itself. Madame Rosemary the librarian, could hem and haw all she liked. This night, Tom would shamelessly partake in the heady feeling of being with his soulmate. And he was never letting her go!


	2. Chapter 2 Integral Differentials

**On popular demand, I am extending this one shot to a multi chapter extravaganza. I have high hopes. The next chapter continues from where The Boy I Met left off. I hope you enjoy reading and freely share your thoughts, suggestions and plot bunnies.**

**I made some pretty cast and story montages. Each chapter has its own banner. You can check them out at my wordpress page - sakshichopra dot wordpress dot com and onto the story page.**

**On to the chapter then...Enjoy!**

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Hermione nuzzled Tom's warm shoulder and shifted to relieve the tension of her numb legs and bum. Tom shifted too, to hide his painful arousal.

"Sore?" he murmured.

"The floor feels like ice. Why didn't we cast a heating charm?" She murmured back. "My dress is…I am not used to dressing up and well… 's not very practical for frigid floor sitting."

Tom lifted her to sit sideways and entirely in his lap before casting a heating charm around them. It boggled his mind how out of it he was suddenly acting. The witch called Hermione was spectacularly distracting. He ran his hands up and down her back, enjoying the luxurious fabric of her gown and the decadent feel of her soft but wildly strewn curls. Luxury and decadence were something Tom didn't have much in his life. He was a brilliant wizard and a stellar student. But Tom Riddle was also a poor orphan in times when the world was dangerous and apathetic for poor muggle raised orphans. Everything he called his own was carefully and creatively crafted, transfigured or plain pilfered out of used and functional things. His clothes, books, personal effects, all were literally held together by his magic.

The girl in his arms, in a dress like _that_ though, was a different kind of sorcery altogether. She chased away a deprivation within him, her bewitching softness dichotomous with his harsh edges, her rich presence filled up the empty coffers of his soul. To have her in his arms felt indulgent as sin. _Not practical_, she said?

"Your gown is bloody perfect. Never wear anything but these softly floating impractical dresses Hermione. All your robes should be acromantula silk!" he pronounced.

The little witch looked over his face to see if he was being serious. She snorted at his earnest expression and Tom suppressed a grin at the decidedly unladylike sound.

"That would work! Dueling in a flouncy skater dress and heels, flying on a broomstick in a cocktail dress and Ostrich feather hat, digging soil for mandrake roots in a tight sheath and silk stockings, potioneering in a ball gown," she giggled at the image of a sneering Snape berating her about how the diamanté crystal trimmings in her dress were reflecting light on his precious flubberworms and spoiling them for potions.

Tom cracked a smile.

"However," Hermione continued "If you agree to occasionally wear your head boy badge and haughtily threaten me with punishments, we could come to some sort of an understanding about my dress choices. Within reason of course."

At this Tom Riddle outright laughed. No one ever _asked_ for punishment from him, threatened, reasonable or otherwise. Especially the poor sods unlucky enough to have gotten or witnessed a punishment at his hands or wand even once. Hermione didn't know anything about those though. He decided it was best to keep it that way for as long as he could.

"Hmmmm. But I don't know much about punishing pretty little girls. What would I do?" he asked innocently.

"Ha!" Hermione slapped his shoulder, "I knew it. If you were the real head boy, you wouldn't have to wonder about it. Merlin knows Percy Weasley has a parchment full of possible detentions and teacher's timetables with free time slots to assign detentions always on him. He keeps adding and removing stuff from it too. Just to spice things up."

Tom made a face.

"This Percy Weasley again. Sounds like a real winner."

"Winner? Sorry to disappoint honey, but we hate him."

"Oh, we do?" he smirked while wondering at being called honey perhaps for the first time in his life.

Tom was sure he would have hexed anyone else to the moon and back if they had the audacity to call him something that ridiculous. From her mouth though, its felt like belonging somewhere at last.

"Yes. I like you better as my head boy." Hermione whispered, coy, with a little smile playing on her lips.

Tom playfully bumped her nose with his and gave her another toe curling kiss.

"Even if I don't have this fabled list of detentions?"

Hermione snaked her arms around his neck and played with the short hair at his nape. A serious look entered her shining eyes. She shifted nervously.

"You will not punish anyone else like that. Only me. You can even make a list if you like."

"Is that so? What will happen to the hapless students I catch breaking school rules? I do have a reputation you know. Most of them refrain from indulging in their natural state of stupid if they know I am around."

Tom's eyes flashed with glee as he said the words about students being afraid of him. He did enjoy his reputation and never let a chance go to reinforce it. The witch scrunched her eyebrows and looked him over again.

"Seriously though. You are not the real head boy. Who are you?"

Tom considered her words for a few silent moments before finally going where his brain didn't want to go before.

He had known this was a possibility when he conducted his blood magic experiments using the journal horcrux. Blood and soul magic could have far reaching affects, even across time or reality. The power of a soul was unprecedented, bordering on supernatural. Magic using pieces of one's soul was wholly uncharted territory, owing to horcruxes being inherently evil and completely banned. Tom didn't have any preceding data. What he did have was hunger for knowledge and power, a pathological need to breakdown everything to bare bones, and an uncanny ability to survive his more fatal escapades.

Hermione Granger, magic's beautiful gift to him, not exactly being of his time was a possibility he needed to accept.

"What's today's date Hermione?" he asked quietly.

Hermione amusedly looked at him.

"The Yule Ball ended hours ago, so it must be after midnight. Which makes today the twenty fifth of December. Christmas of 1994."

The moment she said the words, something shifted in the air around them and Hermione, still sitting in his lap, began dissipating from reality.

"It's the first of December 1944 for me. You're in future. My future." Tom told her while frantically trying to clutch her to him.

Her physical body was mostly gone. Ghost hands tried to touch his face and failed.

Tom fumbled with his pockets and pulled out a vial filled to the brim with a poison green potion. He downed the potion in a huge gulp, closed his eyes and said an incantation in parseltongue. When he opened them again, his eyes were red with the slit pupils of a reptile. His nose and temples changed shape slightly, protruding and forming membranes to detect heat signatures of the living and the dead. The world appeared as a swirl of heat and cold, the hottest spot still being in his lap, a humanoid silhouette trying to hold on to him. Tom blinked and his pupils rounded again. And though the color remained red, his cornea literally trebled in rods to grant him crystal clear vision with color and wave perception surpassing humans. This lesser known sight function from a small group of snakes, combined with his ability to sense magic, let him sense things not quite of his dimension. Even then, he could barely see Hermione now.

"You're too far back. How can I be your-"

"I can't die. My aging will slow." He cut in, while reaching out to the full capacity of his magic, trying to hold on to the witch with all his might, "I'll find a way to find you again. I promise Hermione."

"How?" whispered a wholly disembodied voice.

"Just wait for me."

His voice wobbled.

"Please…" He whispered to the ether.

She was gone.

She was gone.

He could still smell her heady scent. But she wasn't there anymore.

His chest ached with pain he'd never felt before. Hermione's soft hair had slipped away from his fisted hands, leaving nothing but a sensory memory. A night in her presence and now she was gone, taking with her all the new feelings she brought out in him. He stared at his empty palms. A drop of water landed on one.

Tom sprang up and did a _revelo_ to see if anyone was around. With his reptilian eyes, he could sense and see Madame Rosemary at her desk. He could see an elf moving in a wall. He could see the cold cloud of a ghost, Peeves, based on how it was trying to upend Rosemary's quill boxes. He could see rodents under the floor and a bird nest in a nook on the rafters. No one else. No sign of Hermione Granger.

Tom hissed another series of sounds and his eyes and face went back to his completely human self.

Then came rage. Enough to sink him down to where his demons lived. He tried to hold onto sanity, even by a thread because if Tom gave in and unraveled, a precipitous burst of his uncontrolled magic might destroy everything within reach.

He needed to channel the destruction and fast.

Tom looked around and his eyes landed at the Muggle Studies section of the Library in front of him. Rows of insipid Muggle books didn't make the cut of things he wanted to hold on to. They would take the fall for him.

He walked to the nearest bookshelf of the seldom used section, heavy with the weight of dusty books. Reaching within arm's reach, he raised his hands and let go. The cast iron rivets holding the heavy wooden rack to the floorboards were sheered right off as the entire rack got shoved back. It crashed into the shelves situated right behind it. The second rack was thrust into the next one with the force of Riddle's power and it's weighted momentum, cascading into the next, till all five racks full of nonsensical books filled with inaccurate information on blending with muggles, went crashing with a huge bang, generating a dust cloud that impressed even Peeves. The wizard pulled his power back just in time to save the next section on magical beasts and creatures.

The ruckus and exertion of his magic didn't make a sufficient dent into the chaos within Tom. Before he could find another victim, Madame Rosemary came running from the back of the library. The bespectacled librarian gasped as she took in the rubble of books and tall racks along with the Head Boy standing just off it.

"What-"

"Clean up in aisle 5!"

Madame Rosemary gaped in confusion.

"Mr. Riddle?"

Tom pointed his wand straight at the woman and cast an obliviate, followed by a wand wave and a confundus, trailed by a swish and an imperio.

"You were clumsy as usual and made a mess."

Rosemary nodded in faint contrition and repeated, "Oh dear! I was clumsy as usual and made a mess."

"Clean it up now."

"Of course. Oh dear! I would need help for the torn floorboards." The librarian shook her head and took out her wand to start clearing the wreck.

Using an unforgivable helped him pause the downward spiral of his anger more than pushing bookshelves did. Tom Riddle wrenched control back from red haze and started running a montage of memories in his head, one by one, precisely in order. It was a useful trick that always helped in time of desperation.

Four years old and the first time he understood sly comments from the matron and his peers at the orphanage, being stigmatized for being a freak in their eyes. Five years old and going hungry for two days straight as a punishment for an uncontrolled burst of magic, the pangs of hunger in his stomach, the cramps and nausea. Seven years old and the cruel beating from three bullies who were scared of him when they discovered him talking to a garden snake, bleeding almost to death by the time he was discovered. The exact times his housemates had heckled or hexed him for being an orphan, a mudblood, poor or small, until he demonstrated that his magic surpassed all, and proved beyond doubt that he was the heir of Salazar Slytherin, subjugating once and for all the hateful elites of Hogwarts.

The set of memories did their job, turning impotent helplessness to cold ruthless anger.

Tom Riddle overcame everything fate threw his way. He'd never cried over spilt milk. He wasn't about to start now. He wanted Hermione. Time took her away. So obviously Tom would beat time into submission and get her back.

Leaving Madame Rosemary to her long night of hard work, Tom grabbed his satchel and stalked out, wishing for even just one hapless fool to be out during curfew. After all, target practice on the living was much better than target practice on inanimate books. He liked books. People though, were just tools and he decided to put his personal set of tools to work.

As soon as he was out of the doors, Tom turned and lifted the imperius from Rosemary. The confounded witch straightened her glasses and looked around. She saw Peeves, shook her head in mounting frustration and threatened the ghost with a disciplinary hearing with the headmaster. Peeves laughed in her face, upended two more bookshelves and winked out, manic laughter trailing his exit.

Tom didn't care about the poltergeist's antics or the librarian's plight. He practically ran to the dungeons. Reaching the Slytherin dorms, he roughly shook Abraxas and told the barely awake boy to wake up the others and meet at the abandoned dungeon chamber they used for their secret meetings. Reaching there ahead, he cleaned the seldom used blackboard at the back of the room and wrenched it from its dank wall. The wall did not want to give up the board and Tom had to force it with a potent burst of his magic. The castle, recognizing he was Slytherin's heir, gave in and let the board go. Tom levitated the board to the front and brightest part of the dark chamber and transfigured a chair into a stand to situate the board to his liking. Then he started chalking up a complex equation on the board.

His '_knights'_ trooped in, disheveled but alert. Good. He needed them awake for this.

"Conjure desks. Summon parchment and quills. Sit down and pay attention."

Abraxas summoned a stack of parchment, quills and ink they kept in the classroom.

"Are we learning a new spell My Lord?"

Mulciber. Zealous in his loyalty, but not the brightest of the bunch. The thick stack of parchment in front of Abraxas rolled itself tightly and swatted Mulciber on the head, before separating into individual pages. A page fell in front of each of the seven Knights of Walpurgis. The rest floated docilely to Tom and waited a foot away.

"I don't have time for foolish questions. Now, we are going to have a lesson on arithmancy. And then we are going to solve a problem."

"But I haven't taken Arithmancy this year." Whined Mulciber.

"I have. Aren't any good with it!" supplied Dolohov.

"I don't like solving equations. Sounds like something a lowly accountant would do." Lestrange put in his two knuts.

"Exactly My Lord." Nodded Dolohov "Why not imperius a swotty Ravenclaw to solve our problem?"

"Or get hold of a Gryffindor and then torture them to it." Snickered Avery, "Poor sod won't be able to solve it and we'll practice all the lovely curses we've been working on. Win win."

The neat parchment placed in front of each wizard stirred again, rolled onto itself and reared with the head of a King cobra. The parchment snakes bit the noses of Dolohov and Avery, drawing blood and shrieks. They went around the necks of Lestrange and Mulciber, squeezing till the two were sputtering and purplish. The paper snakes hissed threats to Nott and Black till the two picked up their quills and started copying Riddle's work from the black board. Abraxas Malfoy, the only one who hadn't whined at the prospect of extra studies, was spared. His parchment sat on his desk innocuously like unprovoked parchment was supposed to sit. He picked up his quill to start copying too.

"Now that I have your due attention, I'll say this once again. Once!" At this Riddle stared malevolently at his knights, making sure they knew he was serious. The knights gulped, fear crawling up their spines, finally understanding how furious their Lord really was.

"Arithmantic equations have been used in the past to calculate the variance of time, not with much success I must say. The main issues being lack of data on time travelers and events linked to their travel. The theory is simple though. In a static timeline, if a witch or wizard were to travel back in time, was unseen by anyone, refrained from doing so much as blink an eye, she or he can return to their time again, unscathed and without damaging the events of their timeline. If however, they were to do anything mundane like eat food technically from the past, answer nature's calls or pluck a flower, they cause minor changes in the sequence of events. These changes may or may not snowball into major catastrophes, based solely on dumb luck. If the traveler is seen or heard by other people from this past time, people, days, dates or events might be wiped out and chaos would ensue."

"Everyone looks at time travel with fear and uncertainty. They get swept up in the mysterious nature of time and do not think to work around it. For example, I know it is possible to travel in time and let everything change in return to keeping one or two things constant. It is the nature of the equation here. We could decide what to keep constant and what to let go. What would affect the outcome and how to figure out the odds of something happening to the best of the variables."

Riddle turned to the board and wrote down two words.

_Integral Differentials._

"We are going to work on the equation I wrote, add integral variables, and solve the differentials that arise. In plain english, I'll divide you in groups of two, give a small part of the larger equation to each group and then we will all solve our parts. Later I will integrate the solutions and take it further."

Abraxas' pale hand rose up timidly.

"Yes Abraxas."

"What exactly is this equation we are solving My Lord?"

"We are solving the hitherto unsolvable problem of the time traveler's paradox. Through arithmancy."

Abraxas paled some more but nodded in acquiescence.

"Begging pardon" Alphard Black broke his silence, "But it is unsolvable isn't it? For a good reason too."

Riddle appeared pensive for a moment before going on to write down parts of the equation on the board.

"Yes. There is good reason it hasn't been solved yet. But that shouldn't stop me, now should it? I will find a solution. We will, together. It is imperative that we find a solution. Imagine being able to travel in time. Imagine the advantage of knowing what's to happen before it does. Imagine being able to change things. Make them go our way. Is that a good enough reason to try?"

Various versions of assent came from all the knights as they bent over their parchment and started writing what Tom had written on the board.

"Let us start with basic arithmantic equations and go from there. And gentlemen, you should know that you are working to prove your worth in this group. Fail me and you won't get another chance. Talk of this to anyone else and the end of my wand would be the last thing you'll see."

Somehow, all of his knights knew Tom wasn't joking or exaggerating the threat to life. They bent their heads to their parchment and started working on the paradox of Time.


	3. Chapter 3 Topsy Tervy

**Some explanation due before the chapter… Hermione meeting Tom Riddle in his seventh year and Tom Riddle changing his plans from world domination to getting to his witch instead, have changed the canon timeline in a major way. Some of the exact facts that change would be revealed in this and subsequent chapters. One point that I should be talking about is the status of muggleborns in the timeline Hermione returns to. For years now, things have been underway to make muggleborns less than their pureblood peers, making them social pariahs and outliers at best. It is a scandal that will unfold as a new villain comes to picture. I had to make a choice between Tom Riddle the super villain or choosing another super baddie. I am going the path of keeping Tom dark and wild but getting other insane villains in picture.**

**I hope you enjoy the direction I am taking. Suggestions and critique are always welcome. Do review and let me know how it went.**

**PS: I try hard to cover everything, but I know there could be plot holes. This work is not beta'd and I can be a little bit of a scatter brain at times. It would help if readers point out if I leave anything out.**

* * *

All was silent.

All was dark.

Inside the shell of a mind, memories were being tossed around, shifting for the new, blanking out the old and decrepit, fudging this, sharpening that. And in the middle of this turmoil, the witch remained suspended in the nothing. Some time passed as the universe and magic worked in a frenzy to bring Hermione's world back to delicate balance again.

Then, trickle by trickle, a sense of being, the consciousness of living and knowledge of the self, started coming back.

It felt like her ears should pop from the deep silence of the vacuum she was in. If only her eyes would work, catch a stray spark somewhere in the dark.

Faint echoes of voices started filtering in, greying the black curtain of the nothing. The witch tried to turn towards the voices and follow them. The sounds lost the echoing quality,

became clearer.

"Mione? Can you hear me?"

"Hermione c'mon. Wake up."

They were familiar. The witch kept following them and that finally brought her out of the terrifyingly empty fugue she'd been trapped in. She cracked her eyes open and blinked to clear them. Harry Potter sat on the side, staring at her. A set of trouser clad legs shifted behind Harry. The boy with the second voice.

"Thank Merlin she's awake. We need to take her to her dorms. We cannot be found loitering in the halls. Help her up Harry." The other boy whispered.

Why was it so familiar and yet Hermione couldn't place a face on the voice? Something was wrong with her head. Hermione felt around for the pocket of her Yule dress robes and was mystified to find that she was in her school uniform instead, her wand stuck half out of a deep pocket.

When did she change out of her dress robes?

She tried to think but couldn't remember anything past her meeting Tom in the room of requirement except the strange weightlessness that had come over her while everything else melted away.

"She doesn't look so good. Someone must've cursed her again and left her here for a prefect or teacher to find."

Harry got an arm under Hermione and pulled her to sitting position. Hermione's head swam, shivers rocked her body and she clutched at her best friend in an effort to get ahold of herself and stand up. Her legs shook, barely supporting her weight. Harry propped her against him and gave her a worried look.

More fog cleared. Hermione's thoughts went to the boy she met in the room of requirement. Tom Riddle. Hogwarts Head Boy. Was he real or had she just passed out from a curse and conjured a life changing dream with a fantasy guy? His bewitching scent was stamped on her brain. He couldn't be that imaginary if Hermione could recall his scent, the feel of his arms, his lips on hers so clearly. He'd been pretty insistent about not being from her time and coming to find her again. Which meant she'd travelled-

How had she travelled through _time_?That too without a time turner. She needed to get to the bottom of this growing mystery. Maybe the room had some kind of portal. She needed to go back to the Room and start looking. Then perhaps, the library?

With difficulty she raised an arm to clutch at Harry's robes and planted her feet where she was.

"I can't leave. I need to find that room again. Help me Harry."

"Huh? What room 'Mione? We need to go see Pomfrey." Harry replied, gently pulling her in the opposite direction.

The other boy turned to face them. It was Malfoy.

"_Be_ _serious_." Malfoy whisper yelled. "The dorms would be safest for her. What do you think Pomfrey would do when she sees her at this hour with some unknown malady?"

_Malfoy_ was calling _Harry_ with his first name. And it looked like the two wizards had been slinking around the castle after curfew.

"He called you Harry." She said to Harry.

"That's my name." Harry grunted as he tried to propel her dead weight forward.

"And he is helping us?" She pressed.

"I am trying to. If only you two would listen and allow me to help you." Malfoy grumbled, taking her other hand and putting it around his shoulders, partly to further support her and partly to get her moving.

"She needs to go to the infirmary." Harry argued, "We don't know how she got here and why she was unconscious. I didn't see her at dinner. Someone could have cursed her hours ago. Clearly something is wrong."

"Or maybe she passed out because she forwent dinner in her efforts to cram the entire Hogwarts library."

"Look at her Draco. She is shivering. She can barely walk. Her head is literally wobbling."

"That could just be the weight of things she stuffed in her head in one single evening." Malfoy snipped.

Harry grinned at the exasperated blonde.

Hermione blinked, stupefied. First she needed to come to terms with the fact that Harry and Malfoy were closer than anyone knew. Then she needed to tell the two morons off for hiding whatever they had going on from her and Ron, and then, finally slap them upside the heads for discussing what to do with her like she wasn't even there. She looked at the side at one and then the other. They had continued with the argument.

Well, at least some things were the same. Hermione needed to break this up or they'd be arguing to the ends of time.

"Hey, _she_ is right here. _She_ came to this floor on her _own_. And _she_ doesn't need to go to Pomfrey." Hermione stated.

Malfoy huffed in irritation, glanced around and back to reassure that they were alone.

"The lady has spoken. Keep moving Harry."

Hermione angled her pounding head to glance at Harry. His jaw was clenched. She knew her best friend was forming another argument in his head.

"What's happening with the Tournament? Harry do you know anything about the next task?" Hermione asked in a bald attempt to redirect conversation.

"What tournament?" "What task 'Mione?" Malfoy and Harry asked at the same time.

"The Triwizard-"

A figure jumped in front of them with a lit wand, blinding Hermione for a second. Malfoy let go her arm and took a hurried step to the side.

"Bloody hell!"

"Not this piece of…"

Going by her companions' whispered curses, the trio had been caught, and by someone who was not a friend.

"Potty and Swotty engaging in afterhours perversions. Ughhh! Did you catch them in the act Draco?"

Hermione needed to rub her eyes to see what she was seeing to believe it.

"Move along Weasley. You're breaking curfew too." Growled Harry.

"Haven't you heard then? I am part of Headmistress's special Inquisitorial Squad!" Ronald Weasley smirked and pointed at the shiny medallion with a Ministry star on his dark robes. "I can go anywhere, anytime I damn well please."

"_Ron?_" Hermione gasped at last. "What is wrong with you? Why are you acting this way?"

Ronald's face contorted into an ugly sneer. It was a face Hermione had seen often, just not turned towards her.

"How dare you say my name with that filthy mouth? That's it! You are doing detention. First with me and then with the Headmistress! You too Potter. I warned you before, playing the little hero to your stupid worthless followers is going to bite you in the arse one day."

Hermione was stunned silent at the way Ron was acting and the things spewing out of his mouth. What the hell had happened to her friends while she floated in her strange fugue? And did he say _Headmistress_?

"Hold your horses Weasley!" Malfoy cut in, coming forward to stand casually in front of Harry and Hermione, facing the irate Ronald. "I am a prefect. I docked points already and was escorting these two to the dorms. There is no need for additional punishment."

"Not fair Draco. Why should only _you_ get to punish students and have all the fun?" Ron whined.

Malfoy folded his hands at his chest.

"Don't call me Draco. Only my friends call me that. And find someone else to lord what little authority you have. These two are _mine_."

Ronald went a little red and visibly bristled at being told off in company. He puffed up his chest and repainted the sneer on his face.

"Not for long. Headmistress said the Inquisitorial Squad has authority over prefects. She gave us the badges this afternoon, the missive has been nailed to the wall already. You are lower than me now. Careful about the sides you take Malfoy. Are you sure you want to stand against me for a mudblood and a halfy?"

Hermione pushed Draco Malfoy aside and slapped Ronald Weasley right across his stupid face. The sound travelled the empty stone corridor and echoed back. A drop of blood trickled down the side of the redhead's lip.

"Bloody hell!" Harry and Draco whispered together.

"You…you…_mudblood filth_!" Ronald yelled and snapped his hand out to take hold of a clump of her hair. Then he started dragging the witch by her hair, down the corridor.

"Ronald Bilius Weasley! Unhand me right now." Hermione screamed from her awkwardly bent position.

"Let the witch go Weasley!" Malfoy pulled at Ronald's other arm, "_What the fuck_ are you doing?"

At the turn of the corridor, Filch appeared followed by his cat, followed by Cormac Maclaggen and Anthony Goldstein, followed by Pansy Parkinson.

"Students outta bed! Students outta bed! Fightin' in the 'alls. Oooh we're gonna whip the little shites tonight." Filch cackled as he hobbled towards the miscreants.

At first sign of company, Ronald let go of Hermione's hair and pulled out his wand to point towards her. Harry and Malfoy came to stand beside Hermione, Harry's hand enveloping hers in support.

"What's going on Ron?" Maclaggen asked as he pulled out his wand too.

Hermione noticed the gleaming silver medallion, same as the one Ron was showing off, on Cormac's robes. Goldstein and Parkinson were wearing the standard Prefect badge, like Malfoy. She discreetly checked her robes and didn't find a badge. With all the chaos of the night, this little fact of not being a prefect when Pansy, Malfoy and Goldstein clearly were, just added fuel to the already building ire in the witch. Not only was she missing memories, she had also missed her chance at becoming a prefect.

While Pansy stayed back and out of the way, Goldstein rushed to step in front of Maclaggen, trying to keep the other wizard in check.

"Keep your wand in your pocket Maclaggen. No one is starting a duel in the halls."

Maclaggen flicked his wand, sending Harry's glasses flying off his face to a dark corner of the hall. Harry yelped and ran after them.

"And who is going to duel _me_?" Maclaggen chuckled, looking at Hermione and Harry in derision. "Potter here can barely _see_ and Granger barely has magic to hold a wand, let alone use it. Why the School Board continues inviting people like her to this school is beyond-"

For Hermione, the hits kept coming that night. First her mysterious time skip, then her friends gone crazy, then her not being a prefect and then, finally, her magic. Next they would start questioning her grades as well. Purebloods at Hogwarts had been horrid to her in the past, but tonight their words were off the charts derogatory. It was as if the universe was conspiring to get her to lose control and maim someone.

"Hey shut up mate!" Malfoy cut off the other boy's rant, "No one wants to hear you pontificate over current politics. Salazar knows we hear enough of it as it is. Now I am asking you as the prefect on rounds, why don't all of you go back to bed? Potter and Granger have already been disciplined for being out of bed after hours. Let's break up this party now."

"_Like hell!_" Ronald Weasley screeched, and raised a shaking hand to point in Hermione's direction. "That stupid muggle bitch hit me. I am still bleeding from it. Someone needs to teach her a lesson! And Potter too for taking up with her."

Hermione took a step towards Ronald. The redhead was going to get another tight one from her.

"Why Harry?" she seethed, "He didn't hit you. I did. And if you don't drop the name calling, I am going to hit you again. And then hex your balls off."

"For Merlin's sake, _shut up Granger!_" Malfoy bit out from behind her.

"Why should I shut up?" Hermione snapped at the blonde.

"See? Did you hear her Cormac? She threatened violence. Fucking again! She's lost her bloody marbles!"

"She has." Maclaggen pushed Goldstein off of him and came to stand with Ronald. "Let's take her to the Headmistress. I was told to keep a special eye out for the likes of her. We can bring Potter too."

Hermione looked around for Harry, who was bumbling around in the darkness, still looking for his glasses. She sighed and pulled her wand to incant an accio. Malfoy discreetly put a hand on her wand and swished his instead to wordlessly summon Harry's glasses. He pulled at the boy's collar to stop him from walking face first into the wall and thrust the glasses on his face. The two wizards exchanged a look. Hermione was the only one that saw it because the others were at the wrong angles and she was shocked as she registered the gravity of that look. They knew something that she didn't and they were scared.

"Well come along then. Of to the Headmistress's office all of you. Keep them in line Malfoy." Maclaggen waved his wand towards the general direction of Harry, Draco and Hermione. "Don't make me use a _levicorpus_. Merlin forbid Granger's skirt flies for the occasion and we are all subjected to the nightmare sight of her stinking dirty arse."

That did it for Hermione. The tension, the headache, the confused visions that kept forming, dissolving and reforming in her head, the acute sense of loss of her time with Tom and then finally the complete arse over heels behavior of everyone she knew, apart from Harry and Filch, sent the tired witch over her tipping point.

Hermione spun her wand above her head and yelled, "_Avis oppugno!_"

Little twittering birds burst out of her wand. The witch pointed her wand at Cormac Maclaggen and Ronald Weasley. The birds swooped in on the two and started viciously pecking at their faces. Weasley and Maclaggen banged into each other in a mad tizzy to get away from the pesky birds and fell over each other. The birds followed them down.

They were a mess of robes and shouts and twittering birds when Malfoy stepped out and shouted, "Finite Incantatem!"

The birds took no notice and kept attacking.

Harry gripped Hermione's elbow and whispered in her ear to cancel the spell. Someone threw an _Immobulus_, that again had no slowing effect on the conjured birds.

A few drops of blood splattered on Hermione's face as one of the birds flicked a wing with blood on it. That seemed to bring her out of her haze of anger. Hermione took a calming breath and turned her wand counterclockwise. The birds vanished with a last few bites at Ron Weasley's bleeding cheeks.

Hermione glanced at the others to see if anyone else got sprayed. That was when she saw the sheer incredulity in all of their gazes, and the wands pointed in her direction. Only Harry hadn't fished out his wand, though he too was looking at her as if she had suddenly sprouted two additional heads. Filch collected his cat in his arms and took a step back from her.

"Headmistress, there is a serious situation on the seventh-floor West corridor to the left." Ron Weasley said, pressing his wand to the Inquisitor badge pinned to his robes.

"Now you've really done it Weasley! Would it have killed you to just dock points and let them go away?" Parkinson rolled her eyes, "You just had to show off and call the Headmistress. She will go on and on all night. Which means no beauty sleep for me. _I hate mudbloods_."

"That's what worries you? Beauty sleep?" Ron asked angrily, "A mudblood just conjured bloody birds. She set them upon Maclaggen and I. The birds weren't affected by a _finite _or _immobulus. _This is seriously out of prefect hands now."

"Stand back everyone. We don't know what dark magic she has done to gain power. It is better for the professors to handle her now. You sure you want to stand with her Potter? She could be dangerous you know?" Cormac said and started herding everyone back, away from Harry and Hermione.

Malfoy walked towards Parkinson and Goldstein. He came to stand a little ahead of both prefects, gave Hermione a murderous look and fixed his eyes on Harry. Harry lifted his chin and stubbornly stood by Hermione.

Noting that the others had moved sufficiently back, Hermione leaned her head towards Harry and murmured under her breath, "Why is everyone staring at me?"

"You cast a powerful spell. How did you do it?" Harry murmured back.

"You've seen me do it before. What's so surprising about me casting spells?"

"No. You couldn't do it before. None of the muggleborns can cast a strong spell and aim it like that, barring involuntary bursts of magic. Something's happened to you."

Hermione's stopped breathing. She couldn't even begin to comprehend the implications of what Harry was saying about mugglenborns. Who said they couldn't cast? Since when couldn't they cast spells? Maybe someone _had_ cursed her in some way. What other explanation was there to her world suddenly gone to hell?

Hermione Granger, for the first time in her life, couldn't think. She was drawing blanks everywhere she looked. So, she decided to postpone the discussion on her magic, or lack thereof, to a time when they were not being held at wandpoint and instead inquired about the other jarring thing that kept bothering her.

"Who is this headmistress?"

"Dolores Umbridge. Nasty woman. Always out for muggleborn blood, especially you."

"What happened to Professor Dumbledore?"

Harry gave her a quick searching glance before turning to look at the group of prefects and inquisitors again.

"He died Hermione. Last month. Minister Grindelwald appointed Umbridge soon after. What's the matter with you? Why don't you remember these things?"

"Grindelwald is alive?" Hermione's voice shook, barely audible to the dark-haired bespectacled wizard standing with her.

"After his dear husband Dumbledore passed, one could say he is alive but no longer all there. He has been heard saying nasty shit about muggles and muggleborns while being clearly drunk, which he seems to be all the time now. And that hateful ranting has trickled down to everyone else. People are saying awful things to muggleborns and half-bloods, no longer concerned about political correctness or basic decency even. You heard Ron and Maclaggen. Worse still is the fact that no one could have dared say these things aloud when Dumbledore was alive, not even Grindelwald. We have lost a headmaster. We're losing his legacy as well."

Harry went silent and he and Hermione stared at the people staring at them.

Hermione gulped in mounting terror. Nothing was as it should have been. Dumbledore was dead. Grindelwald was alive and the Minister. There was no Triwizard Tournament, only hate and bigotry going around. Blood supremacy was common and thriving even within the halls of her beloved Hogwarts.

All of this led her to the most logical explanation and she couldn't bury her head in the sand and refuse to look at what was right in front of her. She had traveled through time and changed something big, unwittingly screwing up events of her timeline. No wonder the universe was set to thwart her. She had messed up big time with the universe after all.

What else had changed?

Loud click clacking of heels preceded the appearance of a short toady women clad in a garish pink housecoat. The woman came to a stop by the side of the prefects, inquisitors and the Hogwarts Caretaker. She tapped her wand to her palm and giggled at Harry and Hermione, a sound that chilled Hermione to the bone.

"Hem hem. Naughty children. Who do I have to punish now?"


End file.
